1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to image processing apparatuses and image processing methods, and can be suitably applied, for example, to television receivers.
2. Description of the Related Art
Television receivers of a type that allow up-conversion, for example, from an NTSC (National Television System Committee) video signal into a high-definition television signal that has a higher resolution and that is more realistic, have been proposed and implemented.
In the high-definition signal, the number of scanning lines is 1,125, which is twice as large compared with the current television system, and the aspect ratio is 9:16, i.e., the horizontal size is larger compared with the current television system.
Generally, functions for adjusting image quality, such as contrast or sharpness, are provided in television receivers so that a user is allowed to adjust image quality to achieve a desired display status.
Recently, television receivers of a type have been proposed that allow a plurality of parameters to be adjusted independently while maintaining correlation, as in the case of adjusting resolution or the degree of removing noise (e.g., refer to Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2002-218413), in addition to adjustment of image quality based on a single parameter such as contrast or sharpness.
In the television receiver, for example, when horizontal resolution and vertical resolution are simultaneously adjusted to adjust image quality, first, an adjusting screen of a desired size is superposed on a display screen of a monitor. In the adjusting screen, a two-dimensional coordinate system is set, allowing the value of a parameter defining horizontal resolution to be adjusted along the horizontal axis while allowing the value of a parameter defining vertical resolution to be adjusted along the vertical axis.
In the adjusting screen, for example, an icon representing a star mark is displayed. When a user operates a joystick, cross-shaped button, or the like of a remote controller in a desired direction, the icon in the adjusting screen is moved in accordance with the operation, and the entire display screen is adjusted to horizontal and vertical resolutions corresponding to the current position of the icon.
Also, video display apparatuses of a type that up-convert a standard-definition (SD) television signal obtained from a received broadcasting signal into a high-definition (HD) signal by image conversion such as classification and adaptation have been proposed.
In the classification and adaptation, an input SD image is converted into an HD image having a higher resolution, for example, with respect to the spatial axis, based on predetermined coefficients generated in advance. Video display apparatuses of a type that allow a user to adjust image quality along volume axes representing resolution and the degree of noise suppression have also been proposed (e.g., Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication NO. 2002-218414).
Also, in another proposed type of video display apparatuses (e.g., Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2003-224830), in classification and adaptation, history of operation by a user is stored in a memory in advance. When the user adjusts volume values for adjusting image quality such as resolution or the degree of noise suppression, the operation history is read from the memory and analyzed to reflect the operation history on image processing.